


Always Crashing

by ChloShow



Series: Low [2]
Category: The Nice Guys (2016)
Genre: Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Angst, Emotional Manipulation, Gen, Suicide Attempt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-05
Updated: 2016-07-05
Packaged: 2018-07-21 16:26:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,463
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7394917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChloShow/pseuds/ChloShow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>March attempts to rekindle his friendship with Healy.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Always Crashing

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Prismabird](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prismabird/gifts), [Playfulpawing](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Playfulpawing/gifts).



Was this vengeful? Sure, he was no stranger to vengeance. There was that time he’d learned who blabbed about his affair—fuckin’ Dave—so he figured he’d get back at him by sleeping with _his_ wife. Too bad Dave’s wife was not as thrilled about getting over on Dave as March was. She must’ve been from Texas or one of those Southern states because when he’d propositioned himself, she’d pulled a shotgun from the umbrella stand behind the door. Good thing, too, because you know what March did? He went straight to the station, checked if the Nash family had a shotgun registered to them, and slapped Debbie and Dave Nash with a gun charge.

 _That_ was vengeance. _This_ was—this was still waiting for a definition.

The words had just bubbled up of their own accord, rising like bile burning his throat and tongue. Surely the fact he really, _really_ hadn’t meant to say what he said excused him…the first time. The other times were completely his fault. He didn’t even _want_ to say it those times either, but that doesn’t change the fact that he let the words, “See you later. I’m gonna go have a drink,” slip as he waved goodbye to Jackson. The words didn’t slip per se. What was a more apt description? Yeah, okay, he felt like one of those dummies that ventriloquists used, a big wooden smile plastered on his face while he mouthed unfunny bullshit against his will.

Why couldn’t he control himself? All he had to do was not talk. Boom, perfect. No conflict.

But the fact was, yeah, he wanted to remind Jackson that he abandoned him. He wasn’t proud of it. Nobody said he was proud of it. Yesterday he’d even thrown the word “alone” into the mix, which he figured would drive the message home if it hadn’t hit already.  
“I’m gonna go have a drink _alone_.”  
Jackson hadn’t responded in any meaningful way. Maybe he said, “Right,” in his rough, whiskey-stained voice, nodded his head, and drove off to drain his own liquor reserves.

So, _fine_ , it was vengeful. But even then there was a line between vengeance and overkill. And man, was March starting to believe unloading round after round into his unresponsive partner wasn’t going to satisfy him.

**

“Canada Dry or Schweppes?” March opened the refrigerator and held out the two bottles of ginger ale for his guest to choose from.

Two weeks after the Incident, he’d broken down and asked Jackson over for a drink against his wishes. Without any context, that may have sounded like the worst thing he could’ve done in the moment! No. He liked to think he’d learned something from their fight. Therefore, when he’d extended the drinking invitation to Jackson, he’d stipulated they would only have non-alcoholic beverages available.

“I’ll take the Canada Dry. Never been a fan of Schweppes. Too much carbonation,” Healy grabbed the 2-liter bottle and set it on the counter in front of him, “You know why I drink ginger ale instead of soda?”

“Not a clue. Why?” March set the Schweppes back on the refrigerator shelf and chose his own glass bottle of Coke. Without his sense of smell, the most he got out of drinking was the effect the beverage had on him. Thus, sodas were essentially worthless except for the prickle of the carbonation and the energy from the caffeination.

“Well.” Healy had an answer lined up but lost his train of thought once he opened up a cabinet for a glass and found at least five different liquor bottles mixed in. His hand gravitated toward the tequila and wandered over to the bourbon, uncertain as to which vice he wanted to mourn his failed sobriety with first.

When March investigated the source of Jackson’s pause, he scrambled to shut the cabinet. “Fuck! I didn’t—Holly usually does this. She didn’t know you were coming over tonight, and it slipped my mind.” Ultimately failing to bar his friend’s way, March winced as he watched Jackson consider the amber bourbon sloshing inside its clear bottle.

“You’re not gonna throw that at me, are you?” March extended his arms in a not altogether useless position for protecting himself.

Jackson leveled him with a glare, seriously considering the idea, but the current image of March standing in the most pitiful stance he’d ever seen convinced him that a physical assault was decidedly unfair. How many fights did this guy have to get in for him to learn how to defend himself effectively? In the Bronx, it was do or die, and he had a sneaking suspicion March would’ve been crushed like a fine china in a garbage compactor had he the pleasure of growing up on the streets of New York.

“Throw it at you? I’m gonna drink it, you asshole,” He unscrewed the bourbon’s cap, ready to sample the goods, “I may be a bastard, but I’d be damned before I waste good booze.”

A beat passed between the time Healy raised the bottle to his lips and let the liquid settle back down in its place. Everything had its place, and Jackson’s was here, hand around this particular ex’s neck, bringing its mouth to his for one more taste. Just one more.

“Put that down,” March commanded with more authority than Jackson thought he was capable or worthy of. He seemed to realize this as he said it and reiterated the sentiment in a much more reasonable tone, “Jackson, please, just give it to me.”

“Or what?”

The challenge was unexpected and threw March off whatever balance he’d managed to find. “This is _my_ house, and that’s _my_ shit. Give it to me,” he jabbed his finger threateningly into the air, but Jackson shrugged and lifted the bottle again. Technically it wasn’t March’s house at all.

“I’ll pay you back.”

March was flummoxed, searching for an appropriate comeback to disarm his friend. “You said you hated drinking.”

“When did I say that?”

Jesus, he had to be joking. “Outside, when you were getting all sad and shit about your alcohol problem. You said you hated it.” He still felt the sting of Jackson’s accusations as if they were fresh.

“Hmm, I changed my mind.”

“Give me the fucking bottle!”

Making a show of taking a particularly large swig, Jackson turned his back to March before his friend lunged at him, grasping for the bourbon. March hopped on his back, wrestling the stronger man and failing to pry the bottle out of his hands. When March made no show of stopping his useless attempt at righteousness, Jackson decided to place the bourbon on the kitchen countertop. Just as he thought he would, March dismounted to recover the bottle and fell to the floor with less grace than a gymnast but with slightly more finesse than a wax model of Charlie Chaplin.

Screwing the cap back onto the bourbon, March rested against the kitchen linoleum and held the liquor to his chest, a trophy for his efforts. In his relief, he had forgotten the other spirits in his collection, and after closing his eyes and catching his breath, he found Jackson bracing himself for the familiar, jarring burn of tequila.

Deflated but not defeated, March watched his friend lose himself with each sip and searched through his mental Rolodex for the most inflammatory insult he could think of.

“You’re a coward.”

Jackson waved off the remark like flies at a summer cookout.

“No, I’m serious,” March rose and furrowed his brows, irritation simmering where elation should’ve been. He’d wanted Jackson to drink with him. That was one of the few things he’d looked forward to after a hard day’s work doing jack shit. What had changed? “You think you’re so tough, but you’re a fucking coward! You’re scared. More scared than I am, and this is how you cope.”

“And what am I scared of exactly?” Jackson approached March with more than a hint of danger in his voice. He’d drank just enough to negate the usefulness of those anger management classes he’d been forced to attend.

March sensed the possibility of a real physical altercation and spun around quite fantastically to put some space (and the kitchen bar) between the two of them. “You’re such a fucking coward that you’d rather beat people up than face your fucking problems. Yeah. You don’t want friends! You want to mope about your poor stupid life.”

Every single one of the stabs at Jackson’s ego found its target. In his rage, he hurled the open tequila bottle at March, who narrowly missed receiving a concussion. The bottle shattered against the wall after spilling all its contents over the kitchen floor. March tried to flee, but the now wet floor had other ideas. Although March was the most sober man in the room for once, he’d found himself slipping and face planting onto the living room carpet.

“You know what I think?” Jackson heaved March up by his armpits and locked his bad arm from behind, holding him in place and evoking the memory of the first time they met. “You’re a pathetic drunk who has no room to judge me or my choices.”

Neither man noticed Holly standing in the foyer until the front door clicked shut.

“What’s going on?” She held a red and blue snow cone in her hand, face stained from the sugary dye, “Mr. Healy?”

Jackson’s first instinct was to release March, pretending that absolutely nothing had happened, and his partner thought likewise. They greeted Holly as nonchalantly as they could manage.

“Nothing, Holly. Me and your dad were just—“

“Wrestling.” March added, wincing, catching his breath.

“Wrestling.” Jackson repeated unconvincingly.

Holly squinted her eyes, took stock of the scene, and sniffed the air to come to the conclusion that someone had most definitely been drinking. She tossed her snow cone in the sink and navigated her way to the first incriminating piece of evidence: The bourbon.

“This doesn’t look like wrestling to me.” She raised the bottle contemptuously, and Mr. Healy hid his face in shame, confirming her doubts.

Right as March mumbled out of the side of his mouth, “At least she didn’t see the tequila,” Holly had discovered the broken glass and the dark, dripping stain on the wall that indicated what had truly transpired.

“I thought you said you weren’t _drinking_ tonight.”

“We weren’t, but you forgot to hide all the hard stuff.”

Crossing her arms, Holly fumed in response, “It is not _my responsibility_ to make sure you two don’t get shitfaced…or maybe it is.” Inspiration had struck; she grabbed the bourbon and reached into the cabinet to gather the rest of the liquor bottles into her arms.

March watched his daughter dumbly through his usual stupor. He may have possibly succumbed to temptation and gotten slightly buzzed before Jackson had arrived, and that was now interfering with his ability to connect Holly’s meaning to her actions. Both men stayed frozen, witnessing Holly exit the house through the back door until reality caught up with their slowed wits.

“What is she doing?” March ventured toward the backyard until the sharp shatter of glass against concrete made him jump. Healy followed suit.

The back patio lights illuminated Holly against the LA night. Three bottles stood at her feet. _Crash_. She threw the vodka into the swimming pool filled with cigarette butts and the brown beer glass still there from her dad and Mr. Healy’s fight. Two bottles stood at her feet…

“Sweetie, come inside. I get it,“ March tiptoed his way to the pool’s edge, wary of Holly’s increasing wrath, “You don’t have to waste daddy’s good stuff to prove a point.” He placed a finger on the cap of his brand new, untouched bottle of rum, and Holly lit him on fire with the most vicious look he’d been on the receiving end of in a while. March raised his hands in surrender, backing away to stand next to Healy.

After all the bottles had met their bitter end at the bottom of the rental house pool, Holly took a moment to admire her handiwork. Her dad was less pleased.

“Are you happy now? You got what you wanted. You threw away $250 worth of alcohol, and I’m using your allowance to replace it.” He wasn’t going to let Holly’s streak of vengeance go unpunished.

“March.” Jackson cautioned sternly. He knew his friend was meaning to be incendiary, and that was the last thing Holly needed at the moment.

“I’m not happy,” she proclaimed, facing her worthless dad and substitute parental figure Mr. Healy, “I’ll never be happy because you care more about getting drunk than you do about me.”

“That’s not true!” March cried, “Everything I do is for you! How can you even suggest that I don’t care about you when the only reason I’m alive is because of you?” He didn’t have the heart to tell her he’d toyed with the idea of poisoning himself with car exhaust the first couple weeks after his wife had died, gone so far as to turn his car on with the garage door down, but the thought of Holly alone in the world without either of her parents killed the possibility of anymore attempts on his life.

She wasn’t sure what to make of her dad’s plea. Had she saved her dad’s life? Surely she’d prevented it from falling apart. Maybe that’s what he meant. “It’s not fair. All my friends have to worry about is their parents grounding them for skipping school or failing a test. I want to live without having to make sure you’ve woken up by noon or hearing you throw up after you’ve had too much to drink or coming home and finding you and Mr. Healy hurting each other.”

“I’m sorry, Holly, for disappointing you,” Jackson finally spoke up, “I’ll get out of here.”

“I don’t want you to leave, Mr. Healy. This is my dad’s fault.” She tried to stop him before he disappeared from her life for another two weeks.

“No, you can’t pin all this on your dad. It’s my fault, too,” he felt for his keys, desperately willing himself to sober up to no avail, “I wanted to hurt your dad…he wanted to hurt me. It’s complicated.”

Trying to wrap her head around her friend’s admission, she responded in a way only a 13-year-old could, “It can’t be that complicated. Just get over yourselves and stop fucking hurting each other.” She had nothing left to say and no more patience for excuses, so she stormed off back into the house, leaving March and Healy to reflect and inspect the damage dealt over the course of the revealing evening.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Prismabird and Playfulpawing for encouraging me to write more on this!


End file.
